Page:The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, v1.djvu/114

 and called him to order. The Speaker (Mr. Varnum, of Massachusetts) sustained Mr. Poindexter, and decided that the suggestion of a dissolution of the Union was out of order. An appeal was taken from this decision, and it was reversed. Mr. Quincy proceeded to vindicate the propriety of his position in a speech of some length, in the course of which he said:

"Is there a principle of public law better settled or more conformable to the plainest suggestions of reason than that the violation of a contract by one of the parties may be considered as exempting the other from its obligations? Suppose, in private life, thirteen form a partnership, and ten of them undertake to admit a new partner without the concurrence of the other three; would it not be at their option to abandon the partnership after so palpable an infringement of their rights? How much more in the political partnership, where the admission of new associates, without previous authority, is so pregnant with obvious dangers and evils!"

It is to be remembered that these men—Cabot, Pickering. Quincy, and others—whose opinions and expressions have been cited, were not Democrats, misled by extreme theories of State rights, but leaders and expositors of the highest type of "Federalism, and of a strong central Government." This fact gives their support of the right of secession the greater significance.

The celebrated Hartford Convention assembled in December, 1814. It consisted of delegates chosen by the Legislatures of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, with an irregular or imperfect representation from the other two New England States, New Hampshire and Vermont, convened for the purpose of considering the grievances complained of by those States in connection with the war with Great Britain. They sat with closed doors, and the character of their deliberations and discussions has not been authentically disclosed. It was generally understood, however, that the chief subject of their considerations was the question of the withdrawal of the States they represented from the Union. The decision, as announced in their published report, was adverse to the expediency of such a